What's up, everybody? Hope all is well. I am recording this from the car in the jujitsu parking lot, of course. And uh got a good one for you today. I uh finished uh a full day of consulting just about an hour ago. And uh it's it's my last one for the month of January where I've done so many of these seemingly. But I it's I again I whenever I do these full days, uh I love these full days because I get to go super deep inside of a business. It's kind of like I'm you know, a mechanic and like we're opening up the hood of the car and I'm like taking everything apart and putting it back together. That's kind of what it feels like when I get to spend a whole day with a business. It's really it's powerful, and you know, I learn so much, and usually the people that come they leave with a lot more clarity, a lot more certainty, and a lot more feeling of having control over their business. And so I really I love these days. I you know, people they they spend a lot of money to do the these days, but I do feel that they leave with, you know, well more than their money's worth. And you know, obviously they always get ideas to make more money and and things like that, but the the feeling of control and the feeling of certainty and the feeling that, you know, and hope, like it's hard to quantify that. It's hard to put put a price tag on that. And but I do know that, you know, many people feel that just that alone well outweighs the cost of a of a day. So uh what I want to do is kind of shine some light on kind of what I do inside of some of these days, and not to tell you like what the specifics that happen with this business, but really just to kind of give you some insights on the things that I would focus on. So basically, if you were to hire me for a whole day, like what are the some things I would do? I think give you some insights on this call. I don't I don't think it's gonna be the same as me doing it with you, but I do I do think there'll be some things that will will help. So again, the number one thing that I go into in these meetings is usually people are booking these meetings and they have hit like a sticking point. They you know, so some people the hire me because they're struggling and they can't get past a certain point. Some people are doing really well and they want the next level, and they want to know what's next and they need help, you know, figuring that out. But the big thing I I give people is I get them to see things more clearly about their business and what they need to do to create a breakthrough. That's really what it's about. It's creating a breakthrough, whether it's breaking through from a sticking point, whether it's breaking through from an uncertainty of what's next. That's kind of what I like to try to orchestrate and do my best to try to do that. And again, if you're listening to this, you're probably in one of those camps, right? You may be either struggling and not doing as well as you want and want to create a breakthrough and you may be in a sticking point, or you may be doing well and you want to kind of figure out like what's next. I think you know, so some of these things will help you. One of the one of the first things I I like to do is, you know, one of my mentors, Tom Plummer, taught me this, and he taught me that if you uh don't know what you want, no one can help you. And that is like if you don't know where you're going, it's really hard because it's like there's a lot of stress that's created from that. There's stress in your own self, there's stress in the team, people can feel it. But and it even says in the Bible, you know, without a vision, you know, people perish, right? So it's an important thing to have, and and not a lot of people have a good way of uh of uh of of creating a vision, right? They you know they maybe create these you know cheesy vision statements or whatever, things like that. And and honestly, too, a lot of people don't understand what a vision really is. I mean, a vision is just you know a picture of of where you want to go. That's all it is. It's not a mission statement, it's uh a vision is a is a picture of where where you where you want your business to be. And it's you know, set somewhere in the future. And so one of the things that you know is important is the timeline of it. And you know, we look at usually creating short-term and long-term visions, right? I always say that sometimes people have a tough time with creating the long term. Like, where do you want to be in five years? Where do you want to be in ten years? Like, who the hell knows, right? And if you can't get there, it's good to be able to get there in five. And if you can't get there, what I do is I I it's mandatory for me to get you to at least outline a clear picture for where you want to be in one year. Like that's mandatory. But you gotta be able to do that. And the cool thing is like if you have no idea where you want to be in ten years, but you do know where you want to be in one, and the next year you know where you want to be in one, and you string together a bunch of really good years, you're you're hopefully gonna end up in a great place. So that's why I always try to do, and I kind of follow a specific framework and formula for you know what to do, and it usually involves, you know, how much money you want to make, how much profit of that is, you know, what are the kind of measurables that we need in terms of like how many customers we need, at what price points, and things like that. So it's kind of outline, you know, there, and then there's usually some measurable goals that we'll set uh around those things. So that's all, but it's like very, very granular of where I want a business to be in one year and figuring that out. And then the next piece is more of the longer term, call it three years, call it five years, call it ten years, whatever you want it to be, but somewhere is a is a picture of the future, right? And I I really love whereas the one year is very, very, you know, logical and on paper, and that's like it's very like mechanical almost. The bigger long-term stuff is more emotional, it's very, you know, even though it is clear and hopefully somewhat measurable, it's more of created as a story. So that's like I learned what's called visioning from Ari Weinswick, which is a story that you write about your business and where you want to be. It could also be done with your personal life. And you basically just sit down and you sit down with a couple like guideposts, and guideposts could be like, you know, what does the business look like? What does the staff look like? What does my time look like? And you have some guideposts that, you know, will help you. But then you you basically just start writing and you write in the present tense and you know, you create this story. And you know, whenever you create a story, there's emotion that comes with it. And that's really why vision is so important. Vision is so important to be able to communicate it to your staff. That's why like a vision is so important. It's like it's one thing for you to help you create the right growth plan, right? Then create the right steps to work towards it. Uh, you need that, but it's also like you're not going to do it alone. You need people to be on the bus with you. And so a vision is something that you want to be able to communicate. And I found that when you create a story, you know, it's like, how do you communicate with your kids? You know, you read them stories, right? That's kind of what you know happened growing up. And so the vision story is a really, really a powerful way to do it. So that's kind of one of the first things that we cover is what what does the owner, and typically it's the owner, right? What does the owner want? Like what are they looking for? What are they looking to accomplish? And we get clarity around that, and sometimes we have to word shop, you know, work workshop it and create it, but that's it's always a really powerful thing when like you can figure out and and decide where you're going, man, it's a it's it's a beautiful thing. Uh so that's a that's a big component of it. The the one of the other things we do is I always will evaluate the numbers, like what happened with the data points, what happened with the numbers. And what I usually will have them do is bring the last 90 days. Like what what happened with you know the financials, what was the profit and loss statements looking like in the last 90 days, what were the scoreboard items like, you know, how many did they hit their lead goal? Did they hit their new client goal? And you know, what was the attrition like, and what was the attendance like, and what was the usage like, and all these different things. And what I try to do is look at the last 90 days, and basically we do a recap of, hey, how did the last quarter go? And that's like it, you know, the last quarter, and this is an important point, but the last quarter is it's a good snapshot of what's happening, but a lot of people will take like a month and be like, oh my God, you know, last month I lost so many clients, and it's you know, one month is not a trend. So 90 days is a trend. And so we look at 90 days and we look at the data points from 90 days, and then we start to formulate what are the issues, what are the challenges, what are the things that we're facing. And this is something that I'll be honest with you, this is something that for way too long I've struggled with uh personally, and I know a lot of other people do, but like we get stressed out about problems, and it's like kind of stupid. Like it's really stupid to get really stressed out about problems because if you come with the mindset that problems and solving problems are your job and it's just part of your job description, and they are inevitable, and they are never you're never gonna have a business without them, then you can maybe look at them a little differently. It's not the sky is falling thing that oh, I got this problem. What the hell? It's like, oh, I got this problem. That's normal. Let me solve it. And we get less emotional about it. And again, I this is something I'm still personally working on, right? I have to like catch myself and be like, okay, I got this and I got that, and I was like, I'm stressed out about it. It's like, wait, wait, why am I so stressed? Like, just why don't I just like settle and just be like, hold on, wait. This is a problem, this is normal, this is my job to solve this problem. I if I don't know how to solve it myself, I use my who not how mentality I learned from Dan Sullivan, right? Or I ask someone on my team, or like, you know, if I can't figure it out myself or go to ChatGPT, like there's so much help out there now, right? But it's like we kill ourselves with like being anxious. And again, I'm I'm like guilty of this, right? But I've been getting bit been getting better at like catching myself of like, wait a minute, okay, this is just this is my job. My job is to solve this problem. You don't get mad, like if your job is to train sessions, you're probably not getting mad. I gotta oh, I gotta trade a session. Right. And if you are, you're probably like, it's time to retire, right? Or you're getting mad that you have to do this. It's like, no, it's like that's the job. That's what that's what the job is. So solving problems is the job, right? And so we look at the 90-day world of like what the what the data points are because the data is reality, that's an important point to to know. The data is reality. This is the truth teller of the business, and it's telling us what are the things that you know we need to know. And so, like, if I do an off-site and they come in and it's like, well, we had a 2% attrition rate. Beautiful. We don't need to even talk about that. You want to create a new onboarding system for new members? No, you're not gonna do that because you have a 2% attrition rate, it ain't getting any better. So, buddy, that sales conversion problem you got, that's where we're gonna focus. That trial, that conversion from trial to new member, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's at 55%, and we need to get it to 70%. That's the focus. That's the what we're gonna focus on. Right? And so it kind of guides you, the data guides you on what problems you need to solve, on what goals you need to set, on what projects need to be worked on. The data tells you that. So this is that's such an important piece is to evaluate, you know, the last, you know, 90 days and also making sure that the you know, the data that you're tracking on a on a regular basis is also set to help you reach your goals, right? So, for example, your goals on your weekly scoreboard in terms of how many leads or new customers you're getting need to reflect where you want your business to be in a year. Now that there's some math to that, and I'm not going to go through it today, but just know the numbers on your scoreboard, the numbers like leads, the numbers like trials, the numbers like consultations, the numbers like new clients, the numbers like attrition, right? All of that stuff needs to lead you down the path of where you want to be in a year. And so it's possible that every 90 days you need to look at those numbers to make sure they are up to date and on track. So the numbers is huge. Like it's like we gotta, we gotta know the uh these data points. And then and then the next piece is you know, I always focus on in these days is you know something called the organizational chart, right? And this is basically like think of it as like uh in football, it's like a there's the depth chart or the you know the roster or the you know the uh the lineup, right? It's like all right, who we got? What are the positions? And then who are the people in the positions? This is huge. And this is where like a lot of the stress. It's like uh my my one of my great mentors, Mark O'Donnell, said like eighty percent of business problems are people problems, right? And so a lot of the people problems can be solved with being clear on what are the roles that the company needs, and then who are the right people to put in those roles? And then is there a documented process for their job and how they do their job? And is there success metrics like you know, specific numbers that are helping them to tell them and what what success tell them if they're being successful or not? And all of this can be drawn up on a board, it's like you know, these boxes on a board, or like we're putting, you know, the head of marketing here and the head of sales here, and then this is the person that's doing that, and this is they own that result, right? And so we spend a lot of time on the on the people putting the right people in the right seats and creating the right structure for the business. It's a really, really important exercise. And I found it it's really hard to do on your own. Like I I always was very grateful to have Mark, you know, when we did this back in the day with GFP, Mark O'Donnell, doing this stuff with me. And one that not just taught me how to do it, but you know, is is way more effective when he helped us do it herself. So that's like that's a huge piece of what what we do. And a lot of times we'll spend sometimes two hours just on the org chart and putting, you know, the boxes on the board and the people in the in the seats and then creating goals from there. It's like, oh no, this person needs to take over the head trainer role. Okay. What do we need to do to get them ready? We're not just gonna give them the job, just like, hey, you got this new title, head trainer, go get it. No, there needs to be you know something put in place for for you to to to lead them, uh to teach them what they need to do and to troubleshoot with them. We can't just give them a title. It's gotta be, you know, something that they're put in, you know, to the seats. That's a really, really important point, you know. And you know, one of the other things too is we will look at how the team that that's coming to see me, usually they come in a team, like the uh group today came where there's a team of three. Right. And we'll look at how those people are communicating with each other. What does that look like? Are we doing the things that we need to do from a meeting structure point, right? Are they meeting regularly? Are they meeting on a weekly basis? Right? Do you need to be meeting? Are you following a good meeting structure that's really helpful for you? So communication becomes you know super important. So that's something we will look at and evaluate, and you know, and then that and then the next piece we do is we set some goals, right? We look at, you know, the next 90 days and just like, okay, this is you know what we're after. We set our one year where we want it, where we want the business to be in a year, and now it's like, okay, what do we need to do? What do we need, what do we want to accomplish in the next 90 days? Right? And we sit down and put a bunch of stuff on the whiteboard and troubleshoot, and then they leave with their what are the the things they need to accomplish in the next 90 days, and they leave with clarity around that. So it's a really uh really important piece. And the last part is kind of like going back to the problems thing, the last part is we solve the problems in the business. What are the biggest issues that they're facing that they need help solving and they need outside voice like mine, you know, to help them, you know, solve it. And that's kind of how, you know, like a rough, a rough structure of you know what I do with with a team that comes in, you know, with me. But hopefully, like listening to all of that, I I believe that there's one piece where of what I just mentioned, there's one piece of all of that that could help you, right? Maybe you have like no vision right now, and you have no idea where you're going, and you have never even thought about writing it down, and and you don't so you could do you could do that. Maybe you have like your numbers are just Greek to you, like you have no idea you know about your finances, you have no idea about your data points, you have no idea about your track, you're not looking at it on a regular basis. Maybe that's the area where you need to focus. Maybe you got a bunch of people issues, right? Or maybe you have hires that you need to make that you're not making, or maybe you need to fire people because they're not living your culture, or maybe you're just overloaded and you're in every box of the business, like you're doing everything. You own the marketing, you own the sales, you own the head trainer role, you own the finance, you own everything, and you're getting burned out. And when you see it on the board, you're like, holy shit, I need to get some help here. And so maybe that's you. Maybe that maybe you're you're you need to address the people issue. Maybe it's a communication issue. Maybe you don't have people that you can communicate with on a regular basis. Maybe the people that you are communicating with, it's not happening well. Maybe you're you know not meeting regularly and things like that. Or and or maybe you're you're not able to identify what are the big problems and you need to work there. So any the of all the stuff I talked about, there's probably one thing that you could pull and be like, that's an area of focus for me. That's a that's a weak point of mine, and I can buckle down and I can, you know, either try to work on my own, or I could get some help and get coaching and you know, get a mentor to help me, you know, work through some of these things. So that's kind of it. So what I tried to do is kind of give you the framework of what I would do with someone for a full day to look at their business under the hood, but then you know, give I gave you the components of it, and it's up to you. It's obviously not as good as coming in for a day with me, but I gave you the components of like, all right, which one do you is your struggle? Like, what's the struggle area? And again, I work with only gyms, right? But you know, this is true for any business. Like any business owner listening to this could benefit from you know an exercise like this. It's not a gym owner thing, it's just a business thing in general. So hopefully this was helpful and you got you know at least one nugget from it. And I wanna I don't I wanna you to understand that getting outside of your business and the four walls of your gym is so important. Like you there are things that you are not seeing and decisions you're not making because you're stuck inside the four walls of your gym all the time and you're not seeing things clearly. And sometimes some of the biggest breakthroughs happen when you get outside your four walls, when you get some time, when you drive away, when you get on a plane, or whatever. And that's one of the reasons why I do masterminds, right? And that's why I like you know, this one coming up in Orlando is super exciting because it's going to give people that opportunity, you know, to get away, to get outside of their four walls and get in an environment where they're around other people, where they're They're motivated by people that are being successful, where they're getting different ideas, they're getting different perspectives, they're talking about the challenges, and they're learning new things. And that's why I like these events. It's why I put on these events. I put on these events because of that. And I just think it's it's such an effective way to get clarity, to get certainty, and to get more control over your business. Because sometimes just staying and put and hunkering down inside of your gym, there's things you don't see. It's just like even when I just go for a walk, like it's amazing what happens when I just go for a walk. When I get outside and I go for a walk, like my mind is just in a different place versus when I'm in the office working. And so sometimes these events can provide that experience for you. So if you're thinking about coming to the Gym Pranos on February 27th, 28th, and March 1st, you should come for the content, right? You should come because you're gonna learn a lot of really good things about finance, but you're gonna learn a lot of things about marketing and what's working well in marketing. You're gonna learn a lot about leadership and building a team and all of that. You're gonna learn all that stuff, but you should come to get outside of your four walls, to start getting into a part of your brain where you don't normally get to, to start getting ideas from other people that you don't normally speak to, to start meeting people that you could create relationships with that could become friends of yours and also industry colleagues that you could communicate with on a regular basis, and then you won't feel so alone. Some of you are so alone right now, and it's causing you so much stress because there's only one voice in your conversations, and that's the voice inside your head. And what you need to do is you need to get other voices. You need to get people with outside perspectives, people that, you know, maybe aren't emotionally attached to your business. Like the business I had today, like I'm not emotionally attached to that business by any means. Right? I want them to succeed and want them to grow, but I'm not emotionally attached. So when I tell them to go raise their prices and he gets all anxious about it and be like, oh my God, what would this person have? I have zero emotional attachment to it. I just know what's best for the business. So that's the decision I make. And so what happens is you get around people that have that same perspective. They care about your business, they care, but they're not emotionally attached. And when you're emotionally attached, a lot of times you make bad decisions. And you are emotionally attached to your business, just like I am emotionally attached to mine. And I have to create environments and circumstances that help me get away from that. So that's why I want you to come to Jopranos, other other than you'll see me as Vinny Soprano getting up there, which will be amazing and fun, and it's gonna be a good time. It's gonna be a lot of fun. But there's a whole page that's got all the info. If you go to jimpranos.com, you can get the info. If you go like there's a link in the show notes, you can click that link as well in the show notes. But it's gonna be a really, really awesome event. I'm super excited about it. But honestly, like these things are important, right? These things are, and if you don't come to mind, go to someone else's, like, but events are are good. And again, even if it's just a seminar where you're learning new stuff, the act of going to it, the being in the hotel and getting on the plane and getting in a different place and different environment is really, really effective. And I'm advising you to do it. I'm advising you to either come to our event or get to someone else's, whatever. I hope you come to ours. But it's a it's a really, really way. And it's one of the things EOS talks about this is like yeah, clarity breaks, right? Having, you know, it's one of the biggest things a leader can do is get outside their fur walls and get a break. Have a break, take a break, let your mind heal, and then that'll help you make some better decisions. So I hope this was helpful. I hope you join us, gymperanos.com, or click the link in the show notes, and I will see you soon. Peace.